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About Me

Husband, father, veteran and ENTP.
If you were king, you would have a duty to rule for the common good. In order to rule for the common good, you would need to know what works and what doesn't work. To know this you would need to know a little bit about government, some history, science, psychology, theology, religion et al. If "we the people" rule, we have a similar duty to our country. My handle is "Civis", because I take citizenship seriously.

Friday, March 21, 2008

Collective Religion?

The following is Rodak's question:

What is the "collectivist" interpretation of this:

"And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it." (Luke 9:23, 24)

Is the collectivist concept that you all share one great big cross, that you all carry together towards salvation, like a group of pall bearers carrying a coffin together, so that no one individual feels the weight of it?

The Jews were a Chosen People. If you read the Old Testament, you will find that the Jews were not particularly happy about having been chosen, much of the time. Consider, for instance, their actions in the wilderness, after the exodus from Egypt. When God tapped some man on the shoulder to make a prophet of him, that man usually tried to avoid the task. The Jews were redeemed by individually keeping the Law, and punished collectively for the failure of individuals to do so. This is the same Law that St. Paul equated with death. We Christians are saved by faith, and we die only our own death. How can any group have my faith for me, or stand before the Throne for me, after I have died the first death alone?

15 comments:

We live and die for others. Love cannot be expressed apart from community. We see this even in the divine community of the Trinity.

Salvation is communal if for no other reason then the fact that love is communal. Love covers a multitude of sin. God is Love. This love requires sacrifice and an authentic gift of self. Ultimately, we can not separate love of God from love of neighbor for Jesus says what we do to the least of his people we do unto him.

I am my brother's keeper. I have an obligation to my neighbor for the salvation of my soul. A part of losing my life is to live for God and others. My salvation is tied into living for and loving my neighbor.

Against the individualistic interpretations, it is not just God and me. Our salvation is posited within the context of the Church, God's family. We have spiritual mothers and fathers, spiritual brothers and sisters that constitute our spiritual family. We cannot remove salvation from the context of family. For God in his inner most mystery is family, a eternal exchange of self-giving between the persons of the trinity.

The trick is that salvation is not either communal or individual but it is both communal and individual. For we each are a unique individuals apart of a family. Our individual identity cannot be separated from our communal identity. Both the community and individual co-exist. Our individuality never becomes absorbed by the community, but rather the community should represent individuals bounded together in a dynamic freely chosen relationship of love.

We bear our crosses not only for our sake but out of love for the sake of others. This is community is called the mystical body of Cross which is perfectly unified by Christ love and grace working within the members of the Church.

the Mystical Body of Christ extends beyond space and time. There is still the family of God even for the hermit. There is still concern and prayer for the community. What good (fasting, almsgiving, prayer, holiness) is done in solitude is still done for the community. The hermit is still spiritually connected to to family and in the presence of angels and saints. The Church is made up of the Church Triumphant (Saints), The Church militant (those on Earth), and the Church suffering (those in purgatory). So yes, even the hermit can love both Christ and his neighbor the same. You don't have to be in the constant presence of other people to be still spiritually connected in a community. Was Jesus Christ himself still not connected in love to the people he loved when he went out into the desert for 40 days before his passion? Why must we limit participation in the community and family of God to physical proximity?

"Therefore, Christ and me is already four persons. Did you have an established minimum figure in mind that makes for a spiritual quorum?"

What? you are a divine person of the trinity? I guess i don't like your unequivocal use of the word person applied to both you and the God head. God extends his inner life to his children, the Church. His family is held together by his grace and love. Whomever is apart of this family is family to each other. Technically if I, individually, am the only person saved in the history of humanity, then yes, it is only the trinity and me. Otherwise I consider your statement nonsense. Well, actually I do consider your statement nonsense. Because I know my family is larger than just God and I.

I want to make a disclaimer here: I do not understand all of the implications of the topic at hand.

Nevertheless, being a blabbermouth, I can't help but join the fun.

I would point out a couple of things we may all agree on, and I think is part of Ryan and His Excellency's point:

1) Men are social beings. We are wired to be part of a group. We are vulnerable and generally lonely when we are apart from each other. 2) People may think and/or pretend that we come to our own decisions about religion, but in truth we are influenced by the people around us, those who raised us, those we were raised with, those we respect, those who have been loyal to us, those who have mistreated us, those who have been kind to us. So this insistence that “I did it my way” is, more often than not, nonsense.3) Anyone who “Does it his way” and gives no weight to what his parents, teachers, elders, the great thinkers, tradition, the church, et al., is a fool. This is captured well by Mark Twain who said (the quote is as exact as my memory will allow), “When I was 18, I realized that my father was the stupidest man on earth. When I was 23, I sat down and talked to him and I was amazed at how much he learned in those five years.” Mark Twain probably had quite a lead on his old man as far as IQ goes, but experience counts for something.

Please explain to me how the conclusion that “If all are not saved, than none are saved” follows from what I said.

An individual who can bring real harm or real good to the self and community, yet the presence of the community does not negate or dictate the free will of any individual. Love does cover a multitude of sin and sin destroys love and the community. It is not all are saved or not are saved scenario. Rather every individual works out their salvation in the context of the community. And the good of the individual is tied into the good of the community.

God does not damn us for the actions/sins of every individual but for our own actions and sins. We may experience the consequences of other people’s sins given the communal nature of sin, and we may also have the natural tendency to sin as I believe to be the consequence of Original Sin. Yet neither of these pre-determines that a person is going to hell.

I never said God will save or damn us based solely on the actions of others. A part of love is the freedom of the will and the responsibility of each individual to respond to the grace of God. However, It just so happens that our actions/sins do affect others. If you don’t believe that, maybe you need to take a hard look at society. Sinful action has not done much by way of creating a Utopia.

The inherent flaw with your statement is you assume that I am saying that my salvation depends upon the salvation of my neighbor. This is not what I said. I don’t think I can overcome my neighbor’s free will and force that person to respond to God’s grace. However, I can love my neighbor and in doing so express my love for God and vice versa. The love of God and neighbor are one for they both come from God’s grace working within me. No person can truly love God and hate their neighbor or love their neighbor and hate God.

EdMcGon, I would very much appreciate it if you explain how your accusation/conclusion directly follows from what I previously said.

Please explain to me how the conclusion that “If all are not saved, than none are saved” follows from what I said.

Ryan,I would draw your attention to your own quotes:

Salvation is communal if for no other reason then the fact that love is communal.

...Against the individualistic interpretations, it is not just God and me. Our salvation is posited within the context of the Church, God's family. We have spiritual mothers and fathers, spiritual brothers and sisters that constitute our spiritual family. We cannot remove salvation from the context of family.

...Our individual identity cannot be separated from our communal identity. Both the community and individual co-exist.

If salvation is communal, and if our individual identity cannot be separated from our communal identity, then the natural inference is that only communities can be saved.

How about you interpret it with what I say in the same response. Such as this:

"The trick is that salvation is not either communal or individual but it is both communal and individual. For we each are a unique individuals apart of a family. Our individual identity cannot be separated from our communal identity. Both the community and individual co-exist. Our individuality never becomes absorbed by the community, but rather the community should represent individuals bounded together in a dynamic freely chosen relationship of love."

I briefly dealt with both the individual and communal aspect. For you to only focus on the communal aspect to the negation of the individual is to misinterpret what I wrote. My point is it is not an either/or scenario but a both/and scenario. If you want to attack my position you must show how salvation is not both individual and communal.

The whole of salvation is not addressed to just one individual but a community/ church/ people sojourning towards the promised land trying to conquer sin and remain faithful to God. Our salvation is always in the context of being individuals participating in the community. Neither is our free will negated nor our responsibility for our own sin and commitment to God.

One of the distinct differenced between Christianity and religions like Buddhism is the idea of individuality. In Buddhism personal individuality is absorbed and diminished as personal desire is avoided through detachment. To the contrary individuality becomes fully expressed as man becomes fully alive in the context of community. Individuality doesn't become absorbed by the community but still participates within the mystical body of Christ. In other words, we become perfectly unified in Christ love but still retain our individuality. The best biblical image we have of this is marriage by which the church is the bride and Christ is the groom.

I have said nothing to try to negate the freedom of the individual will. To say that the individual is saved only if the community is saved or that the community is saved only if every individual is saved is to make a very specific statement about the nature of free will. I agreed to neither of the previous statements.

Let me ask you a question. How do you explain love apart from the context of community and family? How does salvation work without love? How can there be sacrifice and an authentic gift of self without community? If you can give an adequate explanation to those questions, I will reconsider my stance. You must be able to explain how salvation is merely individual and not the least bit communal.

Ryan,My point is that salvation is between you and God. If the entire community you are in rejects God, regardless of your good works, then you are damned under your interpretation.

In a world where there are more Muslims than Christians, if we assume that Christianity is the "correct" way to salvation, then we are all damned under your interpretation where community and individual salvation are linked.

How do you explain love apart from the context of community and family?

Love comes from your soul. Love in it's truest form requires no reciprocation.

How does salvation work without love?

It doesn't.

How can there be sacrifice and an authentic gift of self without community?

Who is the first person in any community? It is YOU.

Of what value is an "authentic gift of self", if that person places no value on themself? If you are worthy of God's love, are you not worthy of your own love?

Mind you, I am not talking about vanity or pride. I am merely talking about loving yourself as much as your neighbor, and vice versa. YOU do count.

Salvation is between you and God and expressed within a community. You become apart of the FAMILY of God, the BODY of Christ. Your community is the Church the body of Christ, this transcends the local community and includes the Saints in heaven as well as the Church on earth. Everything about Christianity can be understood in the context of family with God as our father and Jesus as our brother, Mary as our mother, spiritual fathers, spiritual mothers, spiritual brothers and spiritual sisters. Under my interpretation you are always participating in the community even if you are not in physical proximity: mystical body of Christ. We can be in spiritual communion with one another without physical contact.

I believe it is possible to be saved without being Christian because that person is still saved through the love of God and the Church of God.

The first community is God. For God is not a solitude but a family. To be in communion with God is already to participate in the divine family. Love comes from God. We can only love because we have first been loved. We can make a gift of ourselves because our existence has already been given to us. As creatures we exist in a position of receiving grace with our very life as a gift from God. Love in its truest from is an authentic gift of self which is found in the Trinity. The Father gives himself completely to the Son who gives himself completely to the Father in an eternal exchange of love. And this eternal exchange of love manifests a third person who is the Holy Spirit. The inner mystery of God revolves around the reality of self-giving.

You are not the first person in a community, but always born into a community that already transcends yourself. You must come to terms with your individuality, uniqueness, aloneness, and solitude, but you are fundamentally made for and called to communion with God and others.